Cankles

The "auto-correct" feature just tried to rename this post as "Cancels". Although I wish I could cancel my cankles, it ain't happening yet.

Ever since I fell last week, my sprained right ankle just keeps getting bigger and bigger. On the one hand, this is distressing, but perversely it is also satisfying.

You see, for the first two or three days post-twist, my foot looked just fine. Just some slight swelling and a little bruising...meanwhile it felt like someone was shoving a hot rusty serrated steak knife up in there if I even put the slightest weight on it. It was difficult to elicit satisfactory sympathy out of my family and my doctor when, by all appearances, it looked just fine.

Now that I am a week out, it's starting to look all fat and purple and scary, but it's actually feeling a lot better. What is up with that?? And why am I now having sympathy swelling in my left ankle, thereby truly creating a full-blown cankle effect? Robbed, I tell you. I've been robbed.

On an unrelated but hilarious note, the auto correct feature adjusts the medication "Flomax" to read as "climax". This made for a fun exchange of texts recently between my sister and my dad, wherein she asked if he'd had his Flomax yet that day. Good thing they've both got a great sense of humor.

Lettuce Make A Decision

I have these cute black strappy sandals with a two-inch chunky heel. A couple of weeks ago, the gal giving me a pedicure talked me into letting her paint decorative flower on my big toes. Obviously, I had to show off these awesome beauties, so last Thursday I donned the sassy sandals with an art-deco summer sheath and headed out for work.

Only one thing stood between me and my toe fashion show - a sneaky orange outdoor extension cord lying quietly in wait next to my car. I stepped on it the wrong way, and voila - I felt my foot roll sideways and heard a pop before I felt someone stab me in the ankle and I fell over on the hood of my car.

Long story short, I am now on crutches and sporting a not-so-fashionable air cast. It does still do a nice job of highlighting my adorable toes, but my fat little foot is so swollen that it kind of kills the look.

Among my numerous visits to healthcare providers last week, my primary care doctor persuaded me to go ahead with a well-visit lab workup.

So yesterday I get a letter with details about the lab results. The upshot is that, after 47 and a half years of incongruously low cholesterol, I have joined the ranks of rounnd middle-aged potential cardiovascular accidents.

Between falling off my shoes and being faced with taking a statin drug to rein in my self-sabotage, it's (literally) painfully obvious that it's time to start choosing lettuce over lasagna.

Will I make the right choice tomorrow? Stay tuned...

In Search of Greener Grass

Just over a year ago, and after several months of bitching and moaning and kvetching, I quit a reasonably good job to move into another side of healthcare. This new job looked quite virtuous and philanthropic and fun; so what if it was a 1/3 pay cut and another 30 minutes further in Atlanta traffic? It was worth it to be able to feel "good" about myself and what I do for a living.

What a schmuck.

Obviously, in the interest of self-preservation and professional propriety, I can't really expand on the assessment of schmuckiness, but suffice to say that the grass I moved to turned out to be Astroturf.

I started beating the bushes about three months ago, once I'd had enough of the yuck factor in my current role. As my dearly departed mother taught me, "do it to me once, shame on you. Do it to me twice, shame on me." Well, after the tenth time of being talked to like an idiot with a hearing impairment, I decided I should look elsewhere for gainful employment.

Long story short, you will just never guess what happened next. My old company that I bailed on last June is welcoming me back with open arms and a great new role that I can't wait to take on!

Am I lucky? Maybe. Do I deserve this second chance? Heck no. Am I blessed? Definitely.

And am I grateful? "Yes" just doesn't do justice to how very grateful I am - to my friends, to my family, to my former/future employer - but most importantly, to my heavenly Father and to His son Jesus Christ. He is the vine; I'm just a scrubby branch who has the intermittent good sense to know that I didn't create this amazingly wonderful life for myself.

You Can Go Home Again

I'm alone at my dad's kitchen table. It's a damn good thing that this table can't talk - although maybe if it could, we could clear up a whole bunch of conjecture and assumptions that have wreaked terrible havoc among the various members of this family.

It's been a crazy week or so, starting with Surgery Eve last Thursday, when we all convened over grub to try and Make Dad Feel Relaxed before his big date with the spine surgeon on Friday. (See previous blog entries for details.) Interesting that there are few things that could make one be more uptight and un-relaxed than a house full of your nearest and dearest in full-bore dysfunction. God love us.

In the last week or so, I've been doing a lot of driving, musing and observing. There are the obvious differences between Knoxville then and Knoxville now - the plethora of new eating and shopping establishments, the many road improvements including roundabouts and the new ordinances in Farragut which requires that street signage remain below eye level so as to emulate Hilton Head. As if.

I love, love, LOVE my hometown - always have, and always will. My heart gets all gassy and full as I traverse the southeastern counties en route, just knowing that I'm getting close. I drive past old stomping grounds of parks, lakes, marinas, bars, schools, restaurants, various personal and family abodes...and the scenes of MANY crimes of passion and mental defect, along with unabashed joy.

Actually, you CAN go home again. It is always there, even if it looks different. The problem is time travel, not geography. I can't go back to the 1970s, 80s and 90s; while that is probably best for my mental health on a number of levels, my past still beckons me to give it a hug.

A gentle, sincere, but BRIEF hug is in order. Then back to Georgia and the life God gave me, in spite of me. But I will be back - spotty and short-ish in duration, but back.

Adventures In Hospital Land, Chapter Five

Dad is so much better today! He is being discharged to NHC Farragut later this afternoon.

Here endeth the great hospital adventure of May 2011!